Recently, the Turkish community of one Munich district had to bury their plans for a new mosque. The conservative party CSU had blocked the construction for reasons of “wrong place, wrong architecture” and the lack of involvement of local neighbors. Furthermore, the initiative was proposed by an organization which has close ties to the Turkish…
Murad Hofmann, a German Muslim scholar and former ambassador, fosters the rediscovery of Muhammad Asad, one of the first European Muslim thinkers. Muhammad Asad, born 1900 in Austria as Jewish Leopold Weiss, converted to Islam during his trips to the Arabian Peninsula as a journalist. He soon distanced himself from traditional Islam and sought to…
The interchange between Muslims and Europe has a long and complicated history, dating back to before the idea of ‘Europe’ was born, and the earliest years of Islam. There has been a Muslim presence on the European continent before, but never has it been so significant, particularly in Western Europe. With more Muslims in Europe…
Europe thinks it has found a cogent way to spur the debate over the integration of its Muslim communities. Under the banner of free speech, Europeans have turned to satire and other forms of print and visual criticism to test Muslims’ willingness to accept Western values. But the re-printing of the Danish cartoons earlier this…
The new director of the magazine Cit_s, Yves Charles Zarka, explains how his new publication focuses on the emergence of a new Islam in Europe. For instance, in his examination of Sarajevo, Zarka questioned whether Islam has changed in Bosnia-Herzegovina since the fall of Communism. The authors in the most recent edition question the role…
